New Jersey Devils Sink Habs and Sens at Home, Respectively

2009 has been kind thus far to the New Jersey Devils as they welcomed two teams from the same division going in completely opposite directions to the Prudential Center. Friday night saw the Devils entertain a battered and bruised Montreal Canadiens team who were missing key players such as Alex Tanguay, Saku Koivu, and Carey Price.

Price went down with a day-to-day lower body injury making way for Jaroslav Halak. It would be the Devils who would get on the board first thanks to a Brian Gionta slap shot from the top of the right circle that beat Halak's blocker side and found the far corner.

Montreal would respond minutes later with a goal by Max Pacioretty in his NHL debut beating Scott Clemmensen with the wrist shot. His glory wouldn't last as Zach Parise notched his 22nd goal before the end of the period. Parise would walk in on Halak going five-hole on the Slovak keeper with a little over a minute in a half left.

Clemmensen would look strong in the second frame turning away all 10 shots and John Madden would double his team's lead midway through the period; he would finish with 33 saves. Coming down in a two-on-one, Madden would get his first goal in 24 games snapping his second longest drought.

Meanwhile, his counterpart would be pulled in favor of Marc Denis after giving up three goals on 22 shots. Meanwhile the Habs, led by their unusual number of supporters, failed to get anything past Clemmensen in the third looking to climb back into the game. Even the chants of Go Habs Go did little to rattle the depleted squad.

Jamie Langenbrunner would cap off the scoring late in the period on a feed from Parise behind the net past two defenders for his seventh of the year. Clemmensen, Parise, and Langenbrunner were awarded the three stars respectively.

On Sunday night the Devils welcomed the Ottawa Senators for the second time this year with Clemmensen getting his 11th straight start. The Senators would get on the board within the first three minutes on the power play with Nick Foligno jamming it past Clemmensen for his sixth of the year. 

The Devils would tie the game in the dying seconds of the first with Dainius Zubrus cashing in on a Brian Gionta rebound past Alex Auld for his ninth of the season. Ottawa would grab the lead again in the early going with another power play goal, this one courtesy of Brendan Bell.

But where there is a Ottawa power play goal, there is Dainius Zubrus. Zubrus would get his second of the game on a redirection from Patrick Elias for his 10th of the season. The teams would go into the third period tied 2-2 when Chris Kelly snapped the deadlock with a go-ahead goal with under 10 minutes to play. 

Desperation set in for the Devils as they searched for an equaliser. They would be given a chance when Bell took a penalty for hooking with six minutes to go. Langenbrunner would take a pass from Johnny Oduya and beat Auld with a hard shot, on which Ottawa defenseman Jason Smith might have either screened his goalie or touched the puck. The defenseman slammed his stick to the ice after the play.

The Devils managed to force overtime after outshooting the Sens eight-to-three, and would not wait long to clinch the game. Ottawa would take another penalty this one for holding and the puck would end up on the stick of Brian Rolston.

Rolston would use his big slap shot to seal the come from behind victory to send the Devils one point within first place in the Atlantic Division. Up next the team travels to Carolina to face off against the Hurricanes with head coach Brent Sutter facing off against his son Brandon.

According to Elias Sports Bureau, Brent and Brandon Sutter will be the fifth father-son combination in NHL history to face each other as head coach and opposing player. The puck drops tonight at 7 pm at the RBC Center.